


As Cocky As It Gets

by seaofolives



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Brotherly Love, Brothers, Canon Compliant, Canon Era, Canon-Typical Violence, Challenge Response, Comics/Movie Crossover, Dubious Science, Gen, Magic and Science, Pre-Canon, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-23
Updated: 2018-05-23
Packaged: 2019-05-09 20:19:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14722934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seaofolives/pseuds/seaofolives
Summary: When the princes both turned 9, their faith and resilience were put to the test. When they turned 99, it was their humility and respect. Now, at their 999th birthdays, the time had finally come for them to be tested for their strength and wit—a fitting rite of passage for the two sons of Odin.





	As Cocky As It Gets

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Fanfiction Cocky Week 2018! Technically this works either for the comic- or movieverse (with heavy influences from the comics bc I just binged them) but I'm more familiar with the movieverse sooo that's where I'm tagging it.

Among the Asgardians, the number 9 was one of the most sacred numbers. Their great kingdom Asgard was one of the nine realms that hung like heavy fruits on the World Tree’s branches. The All-father himself was said to have made a sacrifice in his youth in the quest for knowledge where he was hung on the roots of the World Tree itself for nine days and nights. This was a part of their long history, as much as it was a part of their lives. 

When the princes both turned 9, the most important temple in Asgard was concealed away from the rest of the realm while the boys prayed and fasted for nine days and nine nights. When they turned 99, they were removed from their royal advantages to be in the service of holy men and women, again for nine days and nine nights. There is purpose and meaning in these rites, of course: their 9th birthdays were tests of faith and resilience while their 99th birthdays were tests of humility and respect. 

Now, at their 999th birthdays, the time had finally come for them to be tested for their strength and wit—a fitting rite of passage for the two sons of Odin. 

The rules of the game were simple: each of the eligible ones must prove their mettle, normally in the form of a hunt. Usually, the subject was a wild beast or the largest of the species, but often, a relic was also the game—the older, the more magical, the more cursed, the better. The burden of organizing the party fell on the celebrants themselves, and upon their victorious return (for the opposite was unheard of, for obvious reasons), they, their friends and their family would feast for nine days and nine nights. Because the numbers had to add up. 

However, the Princes of Asgard were a special case altogether; they would not be joining or leading a hunting party. They thought themselves better than that, being of Odin’s great blood and what was bad with a little challenge? They would go out there on their own, armed only with their courage and their particular skill sets, into the untamed forests across rivers and mountains. To prove their worth, they would search for the wildest, largest, most mythical creature to ever walk Asgard’s old soil, whatever would have all of the kingdom falling to their knees in awe of their might. 

Or as Thor liked to put it: as cocky as it gets. 

Loki thought he could just lead them both back to the gates of their castle and still earn his feast—for surely, there was nothing and no one else cockier at that moment than his very own brother. He had an ear-splitting grin on his face as he flung his great ax up to the trees, caught it and tossed it up again to catch it again, as if the dwarf-forged blade was nothing more than a butter knife. 

“I certainly hope there’s no one from Nidavellir around the area right now,” Loki nodded to Thor, “where they can see you treating that vicious blade like a play thing.”

“Like a play thing, he says!” Thor laughed, loud enough it seems to fill the entire forest. “Brother, have you ever known me to disrespect anything that was birthed from the hands of the dwarves? A warrior must always know the worth and history of his proud heritage and that, is me.” He never once stopped his game, though, following the ax’s flight with his eyes even as they walked. “This is simply practice—for when I finally become worthy of Mjolnir.”

Mjolnir—the great enchanted hammer, made of uru metal and forged from the heart of a dying star. Ever since he and his brother had known of it, Thor had always believed that it would one day belong to him—and that every task he undertook, every trial he conquered, sometimes at his wit’s and his might’s end, only brought him closer to its hilt. This wild hunt of theirs would just be another one of them, and perhaps, he thought, and everyone thought as well, that this might just be the final leap he needed to reach the hammer. Him, always him. 

Never Loki. 

But, that was a story for another day. Today, the story that was important was how at nine-hundred and ninety-nine years, he too was worthy of Asgard’s regard. 

“With one mighty swing of this ax,” Thor went on, slicing the air with the weapon in both his fists, “I would fell the beast! And glory would be ours.”

“One, he says,” Loki cackled. “Your mouth says one but your heart wishes for forty. Or ninety-nine, if we have to be on brand.”

“You don’t believe me.”

“I know a liar when I see one.”

“Well, however many swings I swing, it’s going to be much more than you’ll be able!” Thor retaliated sharply, his ego rising eagerly to the attack. “What is your blade?” he asked, nodding to Loki’s other side from where the intricate grip was peeking. “I’ve seen countless, thousands from hundreds of armories since our youth but I don’t remember anything so unmemorable as that. Where did you pick it up?”

“And you call yourself a great respecter of all things from Nidavellir?” Loki laughed brightly. “Fine, let your good brother educate you. Meet:” gripping the sheath with his left, he pulled out the crimson steel with a soft, smooth song in the air, pointing it forward towards the empty grass path, “Laevateinn!” 

“ _Damage Twig?_ ” This time, it was Thor’s turn to cackle. “Really? You love books! You couldn’t have come up with a more romantic name?”

“It’s dwarf-forged!” Loki snapped, slipping the sword back in its case. “And it’s a kenning. If you don’t like it, file a complaint with Eitri.”

“You could call her a stick and she still would be nothing against my Iron Bear,” Thor boasted, beholding the sharp edge of his ax again. 

“Your bear is getting quite old,” Loki returned. “By now, Jarnbjorn already has a thousand grandchildren to take her place.”

“Fortunately for me,” Thor smirked at his reflection, “I don’t plan on hanging onto her for long. No magic knives for today, then?” he glanced at his brother. 

With a sly smile, Loki gave his brother a wink. The truth, of course, was more complicated than that—one that concerned a little side trip down the branches and the trunk of the World Tree, in search of a secret path that would lead him anywhere in the nine realms. Without Heimdall’s knowing. 

The downside, as with many foolhardy plans, presented itself sooner than Loki would have wanted. That he was concealed from Heimdall meant that the all-seeing gatekeeper could not help him when he got stuck in the land of the Frost Giants. For days on end. With no sustenance whatsoever. A terrible arrangement for a sorcerer-in-training. 

That was just last week. Until now, his magic was still spotty at best, what with all his attempts and mistakes just to try to get home. He would never admit it, of course—when Frigga, his mother, had asked him what had happened in one of their lessons, he’d lied and reasoned that it was his imprisonment in Jotunheim, where the giant Thjazi had tortured and starved him until he gave him Idunn and her golden apples. 

That, too, was a disaster of his own making, of course. In the end, he had to look for help on his own and stumbled upon Thjazi’s castle, whereupon he was held hostage. After he made sure Thjazi understood the position Loki had put him in, being the prince of a great realm that would be ready to exchange Odin’s son for something of enormous value. Such as Idunn and her golden apples. Loki returned home a victim, played the traumatized servant when he assisted with Idunn’s capture and begged his father to forgive him and his brother to help while he lied sick in bed. Thor was only too ready to exact revenge which Thjazi didn’t deserve but the blackmail had been set—Thjazi couldn’t come clean about Loki’s treachery without keeping his hands clean. 

As for his magic, Loki decided it would just have to resolve itself on its own. Hopefully sooner rather than later. 

Preferably right at the very moment both had heard the snapping of branches from the distance, like a great hulk was rolling carefully closer towards them, from where they came. 

Thor and Loki whirled, finding no shadow shifting under the thick canopies but both princes have been hunting long enough to know what happens in one. “I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Thor began in a whisper, “but Loki, you’re right! It did pick up our scent.” 

“Of course, I am!” Loki hissed back, glaring at his brother. “I told you I knew how to find the Norn Creature.” The Norn Creature, though, despite its name, was not a creature blessed and loved by the Norns. Otherwise, Thor and Loki would never be able to get their hands on it. In fact, a more appropriate name for it would be _Norn-Cursed_ ; its story was that it was but a simple animal that some wandering magician had given rationality to and then abandoned at the end of the magician’s quest. Distraught by the betrayal, the creature sought to gain the Norns’ knowledge for itself, but what it never realized until the Norns had granted it its wish was that it’s simple mind was not fit for the power it sought. Ignorance _was_ bliss. Knowledge is a curse. 

Since then, it had been wandering the forest, searching for a luckless traveler to tell of their doomed fate, like someone wanting friends but doing it in the worst possible way. Loki couldn’t say he agreed with the creature, but he could sympathize. 

He and his brother were only children when they heard of this crazed warrior being wheeled back to the city, screaming of flames and other such terrible ideas. They heard he gouged his eyes out, too. Sadly, they only ever heard of him and never saw him, in spite of their efforts. He was only the first of many other similar tales they’d collected before they were silenced, using their stories to draw a clear picture of the crazed animal. 

What better game to hunt then, they thought, than the most elusive creature to have plagued Asgardian society? 

Thor was up in the tree as soon as they could hear its heavy hooves upon the earth. “No matter what you do,” Loki said, issuing a final warning as Thor scaled the trunk, “don’t look at its eyes!” 

“I know that!” Thor hissed impatiently, like a child to his guardian. 

Loki heard old wood crack and spun to the empty grass path where he and his brother used to be. He buried himself deeper between the trees, looked at his empty right and conjured a knife to existence. It flickered out, barely a facade of itself. He couldn’t keep his breath from shaking when he snarled, “Fine,” and drew out Laevateinn, gripping her with both his hands. 

When he jumped back out of his hiding place…he didn’t know what he was expecting. The Norn Creature was, as all stories told of it, as terrible and incredible as fate itself. It looked like it once used to be a humble wild goat, that had somehow grown the size of a mountain—an exaggeration but it was by all means ginormous. It had no hair, made seemingly completely of muscles, with horns that curled up and down the sides, framing its head like a decoration. 

Loki felt his neck straining as he gazed up to its beard, careful to follow his own instructions but anyway, from his vantage point, he couldn’t see its eyes. Only the scars where the many hunters had tried their luck on it. “Uhh,” began the young prince. “Hello…”

_Death?_ came a voice in his head, that sounded like the grating of rocks behind rocks, buried deep in the earth. Loki jumped and shuddered. _Are you sweet Death? Have you come for me, at last?_

Loki shook off his nerves and resolved a smirk. “Funny you should say that,” he said as he caught Thor’s form taking off from a tree, his ax over his head. 

_The time is not yet right,_ the creature said as it shook, and for a second there, Loki thought it would get up on its hind legs. _I—!_

With a sudden jerk, it flung its head back, and Loki could hear the distinct sound of Thor connecting to its crown in a very painful way. Thor let out a cry of his own as he landed on the earth, Jarnbjorn crashing after him. 

_I cannot die without a fight!_ the goat roared. 

“Right,” Loki muttered under his breath, spreading his feet apart as he drew the hilt of his blade to his right hip. “ _Norn_ -Cursed.” He thought it had probably already foreseen its death—except Loki was not cursed with the same knowledge and so didn’t know if its death would come from their hands, or after theirs. 

Whatever it was, it didn’t change much of the objectives of the hunt: step one, stay alive; step two, kill the beast; step three, profit from the glory. 

With a cry, Loki thrust his sword forward, Laevateinn’s tip biting at the goat’s hide before he dashed in and swung an angry slash to his right. The creature let out a stunned bleat, forelegs kicking up which Loki took as an opening for himself. If he could just slide past those hooves and cut its belly open, he might actually, _actually_ save the day! 

Loki rushed forward but couldn’t slip before those hooves fell to guard the creature’s weakness, like iron gates crashing. He’d barely gotten his head around this development before a mountain was already crashing at his side, flinging him back where he landed on a tree with a terrible crack. Loki yelped, peeled off the bark like some puppet with its strings cut out. 

He grasped for Laevateinn again, just as the Norn Creature released another bleat. Thor had taken his place, dancing between hooves and bites and throwing wild slashes with Jarnbjorn, around the vicinity of its chest and neck. Red lines traced her path, but not nearly angry enough to satisfy the hunters. 

“Loki,” Thor cried, glancing over his shoulder for barely half a breath before he whirled back to the descending hoof and barred it from meeting his skull with the ax’s flat side. “If you’re still alive, I could use some help here!” 

“Why thank you for your concern,” Loki snarled, getting up on his feet. “I’m very touched!” His back still hurt, but it was still in one piece and attached to the more important parts of his anatomy. The tree behind him did not fare so well, the front of it having caved in with Loki’s shape which he decided to take as a lesson of how strong a foe they had chosen for themselves. Also how nine-hundred and ninety-nine years really is such a short life. 

Laevateinn over his shoulder, he took off in another sprint, leaving the heavy lifting for his brother as was always the case while he kicked himself up the side of a tree, breaking through its bark with his weight and his strength, to boost himself up to the air. He moved the sword between his hands as he fell upon its shoulder. 

The blade sunk deep into tough sinews, giving Loki the perfect leverage he needed to swing himself up on top of the goat where he could fight more closely to his element. Thor always liked to face his battles head on but Loki knew a thousand and one reasons why the best methods came from the left field. He had a dagger in his boot, an extra precaution since he couldn’t trust his sorcery, and moved carefully towards the head lest he lose his footing or give himself away. Neither of them knew what the beast’s weakness was but Loki figured that a loss of eyesight may just as well be an effective strategy as any. Closer to its brow, he raised his short blade, ready to stab—

Some blow that could only come from Thor struck the creature and upset its balance. Loki met a horn with an audible smack. The next thing he knew, he couldn’t command his knees and had lost ground. 

How he managed to grab hold of the horn, sliding down its curvature at the pull of his weight, would be just the first of the many mysteries he would come to meet on that day. But before he knew it, he’d come to, shaking and gasping awake and looking around for his brother who was crying his name. Searching… 

But finding only the wild eye of the beast staring at him, almost the size of his head. Loki caught his breath. He’d done something terrible—he’d looked the Norn Creature in the eye. 

_You are Loki,_ it said to him in his mind, _son of Lau—_

The rest of its words were drowned out in a bleat and an angry roar. 

“Unhand him, you foul beast!!” Thor bellowed. 

The expectation, of course, was for the aforementioned foul beast to return Loki to the ground but all its shaking had done was to pitch Loki at the closest canopy. Loki yelled as he flew. 

He barely caught himself on the branches with his hands before he landed with a more devastating effect. The practiced limbs of a climber pulled him up to safety where he crouched in the cover of the thick leaves. A dab on his nose told him that he was bleeding, and then he found the abrasions on his palm from where he caught the creature’s horn. 

From where he perched, he took stock of the situation: Thor was still on the ground, wearing away with his ax on the goat. Dark spots had since decorated the grassy earth, by now spoiled by the battle, and Loki knew Thor had somehow gotten through its thick hide. Laevateinn was still stuck in the goat’s shoulder. 

He summoned it back to his hand, reaching with his left and produced a set of his flying knives with a wave of his right hand. Loki never took notice; he only sheathed his sword and tensed his knees, preparing to re-enter the arena. Before he could question his sanity, he cried out, _For Asgard!!_ in his head, jumped off the tree and flung his knives onto the back of the raging goat. The sudden cry told him they had landed home when he dived back into the canopy across the other side of the path. 

“Yes!!” Thor roared. “What took you so long?!” His ax flew at the goat’s meat again. 

“I needed to time it right,” Loki lied, now realizing what had just happened. “I had to make sure it couldn’t just shake them off!” Passing from one tree to the next, staying within the cover, he sent off another set of knives, aiming for the eyes. 

None of them made the mark but Loki figured that if Thor could keep doing what he did then there was no reason why he couldn’t follow. Preparing to jump back to the other line of trees, Loki summoned his knives into existence again. 

They flickered off without barely getting warm in his fingers. 

“Uhh…” Loki stared at his absent magic. “Thor?” He looked down to see his brother rolling away from some trampling hooves and swinging his ax madly in retaliation. “You may have to—”

Thor missed. His ax landed on Loki’s treetop hiding place for a clean cut. 

“Really Thor?!” Loki cried as he started to list. It was a race against time now; Loki didn’t quite like the idea of meeting the earth tangled in heavy branches so he rushed out of its full leaves and jumped off, aiming for his brother who reached up for him with open arms. With everything happening so quickly, it was a miracle that his brother managed to catch him at all. The tree landed with a crash and a crack. The goat bleated. Thor and Loki tumbled to the grass with a yelp each. 

Loki looked up to see the battered beast rising up to its full height, the tree splitting in two on its back. Thor was instantly between the both of them, ax out as if it would do any good to a beast of monstrous proportions racing forward. Loki pushed himself up to catch his brother’s elbow, a spell tripping past his lips. 

They landed in another heap, this time not so softly. The sudden silence was disorienting, and the smell of naked earth, without the greenery that they were used to. 

Loki groaned, spoiled by the soft earth on his back even as his brother got up on his feet to explore their new terrain. When he grabbed his forearm, though, Loki couldn’t protest and allowed himself to be pulled up. 

He sighed, dusting his fighting clothes. “Where have you taken us?” Thor asked. He looked up. 

They were still in the forest, but in a different section. The trees were sparser, the sounds lesser and quieter and the grasses grew in patches. Mostly, everything was soil and rocks and nothing else. One end of the pathway led them deeper, the other came up to a complete stop with a smooth wall of rock, shooting up to the skies. 

“Not far from where we started,” Loki said, following his brother up from the path carved shallowly into the earth. “I couldn’t take us farther.” His shaky magic couldn’t do it. Loki was just glad beyond relief that it had behaved right when he needed it to, and not dumped them perhaps in the belly of Muspelheim. He banished the thought in his head. “Next time, give me a warning.”

“It’s just as well that we’re nearby,” Thor said, fists on his sides as he looked down at the empty earth below them. Loki took his place beside him, observing as well. “That bastard’s tougher than Hogun’s smile than I expected, but it bleeds. We just need a plan.”

“It’s foreseen its death,” Loki shared, meeting Thor in the eyes. That was the first time he’d seen his brother since the battle started—he was bruised all over, with a busted lip and a bleeding cheek and dirt all over him and roots sticking out of his lovely golden hair. His right eye was already starting to swell. “It told me, I heard it in my head.”

“You did?” Thor gasped. 

Loki blinked. “Didn’t you?” 

“Well, I was hoping it wasn’t talking to me, it was a very scary voice.”

Loki sighed softly. 

“Well, did it say how it was going to die?” 

“Not without a fight,” was all Loki said, returning to their surroundings. Beside him, Thor ground his foot on the earth and kicked it with his heel, testing it. “That’s all I know.”

“I remember it said,” Thor began to share, “it was not yet ready to die but I chalked it off to pure stubbornness.” He picked up a rock and broke it between his fingers. 

“It did tell me that, too. It said the time was not yet right.” Loki watched his brother sniff the soil off his fingers. “I think it knows it will die soon, but _I_ don’t know how it will end.” He looked up to the sun, casting them in an afternoon glow. “I’m more concerned that if we don’t kill it, it might end up killing us. And I don’t reckon that’s the kind of feast I want to enjoy. Ymir’s bones, I could devour an entire boar now.” His eyes fell on the rock wall. He gave a start. 

“We could trap it,” Thor said. “The soil here is soft enough. If we could just—”

“Thor!” 

Loki pointed up to the wall, and Thor whirled to it. He turned to stare at Loki under heavy brows, looked back up the wall again, turned down to the dry, shallow recess under his nose then returned to the wall. “Oh!” Thor said suddenly. 

The timing of their discovery couldn’t be more perfect; no sooner had they found it than the hooves of their enemy had come like the slow beat of a war drum. It had weakened, that was for sure. 

But it was, by all means, still very much alive. 

Loki stood in the middle of the low ground, Laevateinn gripped like a walking staff, standing proudly with his fist on one side and his dried blood tracing a path from his nose. He tilted his head up as the Norn Creature approached, keeping his eyes set on its bruised nose. 

_You would not hear your fate?_ it asked him. 

Loki smirked easily. “Sometimes, one can only hear these stories too much. I already know my fate without you telling me: I slay you, I go back to the castle, we hold a feast to my name and everyone celebrates. Gods bless Loki, Son of Odin.”

_This fate you speak of,_ the Norn Creature replied, with what Loki thought was a note of disappointment. _It is different._

“Creative license.”

_It is not the fate that you will face after our meeting._

“Fine,” Loki shrugged. “Humor me.”

_Then look,_ the goat lowered its great head, _into my eyes._

“Now I may be wrong but I certainly am no foo—” 

“ _—or Asgaaaaard—!!_ ”

Thor was like a sudden bird, flying across the empty afternoon sky in a wide arc, like the crest of a rainbow over Loki and the Norn Creature. Both looked up and followed his path with their eyes. 

They turned to face each other. _Your brother missed,_ the Norn Creature informed Loki. 

But Loki only smiled. “I wouldn’t say that.” Brave words he’d almost eaten up when a great, thunderous boom burst out from the sky. Had the circumstances been any different, and perhaps less life-threatening, he would have been embarrassed to know how great his heart could leap in his shock. 

All that disappeared when he turned to see Thor attached to the rock face with Jarnbjorn, the smell of lightning and burnt air easily detectable all around them. Thor had to plant his feet flat on the surface before he could pry his ax loose where it bit into the rock. He fell down in a series of somersaults, fighting desperately to get ahold of his weight. 

Racing the clear water gushing out of the new crevice, punching it wider from the inside, fighting for freedom. Like the relief washing over him at a plan that worked. He felt good about himself—proud of his studious mind, his excellent memory. How else could he remember that once upon a time, some ancient ancestor of his and Thor’s had sealed up this reopened waterfall to divert the river for some purpose or other? As long as you were of royal blood after all, and better if you had some noble excuse, magic came very easily. 

Too bad these weren’t theatrics the goat appreciated, which cried out in rage and perhaps, in surprise and fear. It knew it was going to die, and perhaps longed for it. But in the end, it was but an animal, driven purely by its instincts. 

Loki smiled winsomely at it and shrugged. The goat rushed down to bite his head off but tasted nothing but the residue of his illusion. 

Putting it at a perfect height for Thor to slash at his eyes with his ax. 

The forest could not have heard of a greater cry from any of its creatures, and one that was so shattering to the soul. If Thor had been made of weaker stuff, he might have crumbled under the goat’s pain. 

But he wasn’t—he was made exactly _for_ this, and nothing gave him greater courage than the sound of his enemy’s defeat. He could tell that the beast was now trying to get away from the fight, but the replenished river and the earth beneath were making it difficult. By all means, the goat was stuck; it would die there. 

“Not so cocky now, huh?!” Thor threw its head back with an upward swing of his ax. “Loki, now!!” 

And Loki reappeared, mounting the goat like a gargantuan horse, wrapping his arms around its thick neck to stab and pull with Laevateinn, sawing its neck open. He could not finish the whole task—warm, bountiful blood had already gushed out of the wound as the creature struggled, dressing his arm and hand in its crimson flow but the hide and the muscles were too tight for a quick job. In the end, Loki had to abandon his mission, jumping down the shallow river when Thor slid forward on his knees and broke the creature’s forelegs in two. 

The great beast crashed, pink water splashing over the brothers who stood panting before it. One of its eyelid fluttered open. 

Thor and Loki froze suddenly at the grave mistake staring back at them: Thor had missed its left eye. 

_Thor and Loki,_ the great goat heaved, its muscles shaking as it fought the earth beneath it to breathe. _Two princes. Two sons of kings…fate has made great pawns of you both._

Loki shuddered at its words. “How dare you,” he snarled. 

“Loki, don’t listen to it!” Thor barked. 

_You will be at the cusp of a great change._ The great left eye grew at the telling. _But on opposing ends. What is now, will never more be._

“Loki!!” 

_Blood against blood. Might against magic._ Loki jumped. _An inescapable cycle, until everything burns—_

“ _Enough!!_ ”

A blow of thunder, bursting with lightning. The spectacle had stunned Loki out of his trance, jumping at the electric shock coursing through him. It took him a moment to remember where he was, his changed surroundings: the forest now looked darker, the smell of burnt flesh and meat wafting from the river. 

Thor was gasping, his shoulders moving with every breath taken. He’d buried Jarnbjorn deep into the late creature’s skull, splitting its crown cleanly in half, the line running down to the bridge of its nose. Thor and Loki turned to each other. 

He left Jarnbjorn nestled between grey matter and bones when he stumbled towards his brother, bloody hands out, grasping Loki by the sleeves. His unsteady weight nearly caused Loki to slip in the water if he hadn’t grasped at Thor with his own sticky fingers for his balance. 

“Brother, those words are the words of a dying beast,” Thor rasped. He looked pale, Loki thought, with his bloodshot eyes and his stark wounds and his wild, dripping hair. “That’s it, that’s all they are! They hold no meaning, they hold us to _nothing_.”

“Thor…” Loki began. But he wasn’t scared, he’d wanted to say, but he knew that was a lie that would never sell itself. Thor wouldn’t believe him—there was simply no way _he_ could not be scared when Thor was… 

“I swear to you, Brother,” Thor said, moving his hand to grasp the back of Loki’s neck like a plea for his understanding, his thumb firm behind his ear. “I swear to you, and on Bor’s and Odin’s names, I will not let anything come between us. Do you understand that?” he asked, speaking to his eyes, his own blue gaze a promise of a bright future. But whose, Loki couldn’t say; he could only stare. 

“You are my brother, Loki,” Thor continued, his hand shifting slightly. “And nothing can change that. This, I swear to Valhalla, and to the World Tree, as Thor, Son of Odin. This. I _swear_.”

Heartening words, but Loki wondered if that was what ought to scare him: all these promises. All these great names. Why? Why summon their presence? Perhaps, it was because…the words of a dying beast held a nugget of truth in them. One so small so as to be hidden under their intricate foundation, but enough to topple it. Was it the jealousy? That Loki felt towards Thor’s many advantages. Was it the estrangement he’d always felt from his father? Who’d always loved Thor above all, in spite of all his glaring faults. But what then? It should change nothing, should it? 

Thor loved Loki, and Loki loved Thor—his protector, his friend. His blood and brother. Loki _loved Thor_ —and that was a truth that could never be a lie. 

He couldn’t stop Thor’s arms when they seized him, blood and sweat and all, and himself when he returned it, clasping his brother as tightly as he could muster although he was surely no match to his bone-crushing strength. In the years to follow, this same oath would sear like a curse branded on his back, never to disappear no matter how many times he clawed it off. Come the more distant future, he would patch it up, as best as he could, with balms and stitches. The scars would be ugly, but it would still be there. It would not be so bad. He hoped. Like a fool hopes. 

“I hear you. Thor, Son of Odin,” Loki assured him in a whisper loud enough to fill the forest. “I hear you. You don’t have to fear. Those were only words, Thor.” He pulled away, slightly, only so he could smile at his brother who loved him. “And words are but wind.”

**Author's Note:**

> "Damage Twig" is a good name, y'all are just mean.


End file.
